“Well, if there's a bright center to the Universe, you're on the planet that it's farthest from…”
Such was the perspective of Luke Skywalker concerning his home planet Tatooine. Based on what we learn of his life, the more understandable his viewpoint is. Given that under the watchful and eye of his Uncle Owen he couldn't even run out to the nearest hardware store, it's more than evident that Luke finds himself trapped in an obscure corner of an obscure planet; but, importantly, he had not yet discovered how the story of a greater world would come to him and change everything.
John, the author of Revelation, may well have felt the same about the place where he found himself. He testifies that he was exiled on the Island of Patmos, clearly at the best of the Roman government, who intended to corral his words and gospel witness. And if there was a bright center to be found in the first century (Rome), then Patmos could have a legitimate claim for the most desolate, off-grid place around.
Yet it was here in the boonies, far from the imperial city of Rome, that Christ appeared to John, initiating the vision which would become the book of Revelation. The sheer fact that Christ found and visited John; that, far from being lost and forgotten, John was the object of Christ’s love, direction, and provision, is something which is worthy of our attention. This is the perspective we ourselves are meant to maintain. Our faith must rest in Jesus, and we are exhorted not to see our present day Babylon as an all-powerful and omni-competent master. Neither are we to see ourselves as lost in the cosmos, up the creek without a paddle, or tragically left behind. Another way of stating this in biblical tones is to assert that “God is with us” - just as God was with Noah, with Abraham, with Joseph, with Moses, with David, and many others.
Revelation 1:9-20 establishes the setting in which John's vision began. But it also establishes the truths by which we can have confidence and assurance even when a godless world seems invincible and unassailable. In reformed terminology, this passage offers a resounding answer to the question posed by the Heidelberg Catechism:
What is your only comfort in life and in death?
Here is what John lays before us.
There is no place on earth where we will be abandoned.
In the book of Revelation, it does not take long to discover that this present world is not a friend or ally for the believer. In fact, the text of Revelation makes frequent use of the phrase “earth dwellers” - “those who live on earth” - as a designation of those who disbelieve and oppose the gospel. It is this set of people for whom a flying eagle brings warnings of what is to come. It is this people to whom heaven’s messengers pronounce “Woe.”
Of course, the earth is also the home of believers, who by the end of the first century had spread across the lands of the Roman empire. Churches had sprung up in Asia Minor, where they often found themselves at odds with both pagan society and Jewish society (This is the theme of 1 Peter). If this was “home”, it was a home which could be cruel and difficult. It is that disconnect which was the source of confusion and discouragement for the church; but John’s vision suggests that there is reason to take heart. How so? Where Christ is, God is.
We’ve already noted that this island of banishment where John found himself was the place of Christ’s own visitation. Where John, by all appearances, seems to be utterly alone and forgotten, he discovers that Christ has come to him. This thought of Christ coming to his people becomes the image which is presented to the church at Laodicea:
Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come into him, and eat with him and he with me. (3:20)
This promise, of course, derives from the promise given by Jesus himself when he commissioned his disciples to make him known (Matthew 28:19-20); and his promise was good to the end of the age.
Christians living in the United States often feel as if their world (where human life and relationships seem ordered, without threat or fear) is shrinking. The ideologies of Western culture appear to have taken over the laws and discourse of every place, especially our cities and univerisities. It appears as the dominant voice on televised entertainment and social media. And the fact that such was not the case only fifty years previously is the source of anger, resentment, fear, or withdrawal. How are we to practice our faith, let alone evangelize the world, when this is the kind of world in which we find ourselves?
Addressing this despair is the very reason for this revelation. Such is the nature of exhortations we find in the New Testament letters:
For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome this world - our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? (1 John 5:4-5)
Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. (1 Peter 3:14-16)
Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel, and not frightened by anything by your opponents…For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for him. (Philippians 1:27-29)
But what would be capable of giving us that spiritual backbone? This is what John next reveals.
There is no stronger ally than the One who is on our side.
In the previous section of our text, we read about a great voice which John heard. When we commence with the next section (v.12-16), we read about a great being whom John saw.
On turning, I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.
What John presents us with is genuinely apocalyptic language - it isn’t focused on human features as much as it asks the reader to take note of the qualities which characterize the one at the center of things.
John’s first sight is the seven golden lampstands, but it’s the presence of “one like a son of man” in the center of the lampstands which draws his attention.
The feature of a long robe with a sash across the chest may invoke two related Old Testament allusions: (1) a priest serving within the temple, where the lampstands would represent the light of God’s presence; (2) a king dressed to reflect his authority (see, for example, Isaiah 6).
The attribute of white hair is evocative of Daniel’s portrayal of the Ancient of Days in Daniel 7
Like flames of fire is the John’s description of Christ’s eyes. Fire represents accusatory judgment which functions as its own assessment of humans.
Much is made of Christ’s feet, which John compares to burnnished bronze, refined in a furnace. Two referents can be identified here. First, unlike the feet of clay which characterized the immense image which Nebuchadnezzar saw, the Son of Man possesses a refining which renders him invulnerable to the opposition to God and his kingdom. Second, the reference to a furnace calls to mind the fiery furnace into which Daniel’s friends were cast by Nebuchadnezzar. The flames did not consume them, but only burned off their rope cuffs.
John returns to the sound of this man’s voice: as overwhelming as the roaring ocean in volume and majesty.
Finally, John sees a two-edged sword emerge from Christ’s mouth, and a face which glowed with all the intensity of the sun.
What John reveals in this composite picture of the risen Christ is someone who is without peer or equal. He does be cajoled or shamed or bribed into action. He directs all things according to the counsel of his own will. And most importantly, this man is on our side.
Did we in our own strength confide/Our prospect would be losing/Were not the right man on our side/the man of God’s own choosing/Dost ask who that may be?/Christ Jesus it is he….
Well might we call to mind the magnificent truths of Romans 8:
What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies…
Here is the math we must grasp. God, plus one servant is a supermajority. If God is on our side, it makes no difference who lines up against us. On the other hand, if God is against us, it is no use having a batallion in your corner; you’re outnumbered and outgunned.
The celestial figure John sees is our promised ally, mediator, provider, and friend. And if that’s the case, we need not fear the worst of kings and beasts. Let Babylon release whatever hounds it has. We can stand firm.
What comes next in our text (v.17-20) narrates the result of encounters John has with the risen Christ. But it also affords us a third reason to embrace Christ and find hope.
There is no greater truth for humanity than the truth of Jesus Christ.
It was the Roman governor Pontius Pilate who was called on to settle the question of Jesus’ guilt or innocence of the charges brought by the religious authorities. Pilate was perplexed at Jesus “failure” to speak for himself. The best he could do was to pick up on Jesus’ assertion that he was, indeed King of the Jews.
“So you’re a king….”, Pilate surmised. But Jesus made clear that his “kingdom” was unlike the kingdoms Pilate knew:
You say I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world - to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.
But this statement was lost on Pilate. Truth was not a political reality. Truth was often for sale to the highest bidder. No doubt with a tone of cynicism, he spoke to no one in particular: “What is truth?”
Readers of the Gospel of John and the Letters of John recognize quickly that Truth is front and center in importance for understanding Jesus. It’s an important designation which Jesus used of himself.
He is the true bread of heaven who gives life to the world.
He is the true light that enlightens every man coming into the world
He is the true shepherd of Israel
He is the true vine which constitutes Israel
In all these instances, “true” is what accords with the purposes and promises of God. It is a synonym of the adjective “faithful”. In fact, the Hebrew word ‘emeth can mean both. To be true is to be faithful. To be faithful is to be true.
Likewise for John, truth establishes realities which can’t be ignored without consequence.
I write to you not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and because no lie is of the truth. Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? (1 John 2:21-22)
Paul insists on the importance of truth as it relates to Jesus:
Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds…But that is not how you learned Christ - assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus. (Ephesians 4:17, 20-21)
In our present day, truth has fallen on hard times culturally. Each person is now the arbiter of their own truth, answering only to their inner desires for what is called “authenticity” (which is also self-referential). Beyond this there are no rules, and everyone is right, with the exception of those who deny that everyone is right.
Even as the truth about Jesus and from Jesus was, in the first century, the target of avoidance at best, and opposition at worst, so it is today. But this is not a liability for the church. It’s essential for the church to be judged “faithful” - in accord with the truth. And, as Jesus said, “Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” The church cannot afford to tailor Jesus to the inclinations of people in the world. We cannot “reimagine” Jesus and possess the true Jesus. For Jesus is the only being who can proclaim truth about God, about the world, about ourselves, and about the end of time and history.
Without this Jesus, the world is lost and self-deluded. Rejecting the truth of God will boomerang and produce people who will believe anything besides the truth. John will later describe “those who dwell on the earth” as drugged into a state of self-deception, willing to hear and obey whatever the beast from the land offers.
My Only Comfort, Then and Now
The Heidelberg Catechism, having been published in 1563, had the testimony of the Scriptures from which to formulate its teachings on grace, gratitude, and glory. But theirs was no mere rote parroting of the Bible. And their own setting was no ordinary time or place. The reformers of the 16th century lived through harrowing circumstances, facing the daunting task of following God’s truth, whatever the cost. So when they asked what our only comfort is in life and death, they had an answer.
That I with body and soul, both in life and death, am not my own, but belong unto my faithful Savior Jesus Christ; who, with his precious blood, has fully satisfied for all my sins, and delivered me from all the power of the devil; and so preserves me that without the will of my heavenly Father, not a hair can fall from my head; yea, that all things must be subservient to my salvation, and therefore, by his Holy Spirit, also assures me of eternal life, and makes me sincerely willing and ready, henceforth, to live for him.
Five hundred years later, that still sounds pretty good.